The Iron Hall is starting to quiet. So many eyes. I feel them scrubbing every inch of me.
A flurry of whispers, a fanfare as Nikolai finally enters the hall. I watch him step to the balcony’s edge above us. I try to use my reliable hatred to center me, but I can’t shake the feeling of Andrei’s eyes.
A screech of violins, preparing.
Sofie is right. I’m going to vomit.
Then, all at once, Natasha is on the other side of my silk. Her face is all I see, cut in two by shimmering blue fabric. Her cheekbones glisten silver. She puts her hands between mine on my silk, our fists in a stack. When she tilts her forehead to mine, her voice makes everything else hushed.
“Watch the water,” she says. “Don’t look at the crowd. Don’t even think about the crowd. Just keep watching the water.”
“The water,” I say. I feel slow, like I’m stuck in a fog bank.
“That’s what I do when I’m nervous,” she says. “At the festivals. I watch the canal water.”
I didn’t know Natasha could get nervous.
Before I can thank her for the advice, she’s gone again, back at her own silk, and the violins begin to weep.
As I climb, I stare at the water below, just like Natasha told me to. When I spin and thread and loop myself through the silks, my gaze returns to the water. I try to focus on a spot between the surface and the bottom.
When I finally look up, not at Andrei, not at the crowd, but at the shimmer of fabric and flyers around me, I feel like I’m made of water. We are rain-dropping, cascading, sea-spraying, up and down above our pool.
Is this what Nikolai and Gospodin wanted? Does this make the watching partygoers less afraid of death-by-ocean?
We think we’ve outsmarted water, with our ships and roofs and barometers. We collect it in basins and sieve it through wool and charcoal so we can drink it. We give it to our cattle and we give it to our grains. Nikolai has installed a pool in the middle of the Iron Hall just for tonight, just for this performance, so that everyone might gather around and marvel at how we have tamed water, when really, it has tamed us.
I’m glad for the nonstop rehearsals now that we’re in the middle of the flight. My mind can be elsewhere and let my body do the rest. When I’ve finished executing my trickiest sequence, I hang still on the silks. Only Natasha keeps moving.
She is water. Flowing and seamless and liquid, her face calm, her hands steady. The whole room is transfixed. I only manage to drag my eyes away from her for a moment. I look to the balcony, near level with us, and I see Nikolai, his fingers curling over the railing’s edge, his jaw set, his eyes pinned to Natasha with such intensity, I think I could light myself on fire before he looked away.
The final sequence: wheeldowns, fast as can be, all of us together. We hurtle toward the water. Someone gasps.
I catch myself on the silk inches from the surface. We hang for a breath, the violins humming their final notes.
Then we slide into the water.
When I come up again, the applause shakes the chandelier overhead. Someone’s hand touches my shoulder; someone calls congratulations. A towel is draped over me.
I tilt my chin, water running down my nose, and look up at Nikolai.
He still hasn’t looked away from Natasha.
A coldness settles in my stomach. I can’t put a name to it, but it leaves me feeling unmoored. The hairs on my arms stand on end.
I track his gaze across the Iron Hall, back to Natasha, with her streaming hair, her dripping full-suit, the faint shake in her legs from the exertion of the performance.
She’s staring back at Nikolai, and her lips are curling to a smile.
29
NATASHA
Nikolai’s eyes are steady as they meet mine. He looks kingly, imperious, adult.
Adelaida wraps a towel around my shoulders. I startle; when I look back to Nikolai, he’s walking away from the balcony.
“You look like a drowned rat.” Adelaida runs her thumb along the underside of my eye. It comes away smudged with makeup.
“And you look like a giant blue jay,” I say.
I’m buzzing too much from the performance to absorb Adelaida’s barbs. Every moment on the silks, I felt power refilling my veins, a confidence I’ve missed since the crane season festival. I feel brilliant and reckless and alive.
“You should go change,” Adelaida says.
“I’ll dry off as I dance.” I hand her back the towel. I’m vaguely conscious of the other flyers gathered behind me, and I know that I ought to debrief with them, but there is Nikolai, striding down the stairs, guards fanning out behind him.
So I walk away from the other flyers.
The crowd moves in eddies. Everyone wants to step out of Nikolai’s way, for politeness’ sake, but stay close enough to watch him, for gossip’s sake. And as I walk through the crowd, people jump, afraid I’ll dampen their finery. Then the crowd has parted between us, and Nikolai and I stop, and he tilts his head at me, and I drop into a low, slow curtsy as the musicians start in on a waltz.
“Miss Koskinen,” he says, my name made a formal, royal thing on his tongue, “would you have this dance?”
I step forward so we’re toe to toe. I’m surprised to find that we’re the same height.
“I’m afraid I’m a bit sodden,” I say.
“Indeed.” Nikolai is smiling. At me. “You’re also not wearing shoes.” He extends his hand.
I take it.
I have spent most of my life thinking of Nikolai as less of a person and more of a title. With his face so close to mine, our palms pressed, it’s harder to forget the young man underneath the crown.
“I haven’t seen you since the hot pools,” he says.
“Adelaida keeps us rehearsing,” I say.
If he minds that my hand is wet on his shoulder, he doesn’t show it. Around us, men and women pair off. We begin to dance.
“I like your necklace,” he says.
I glance down at it. The ring hanging over my heart. “We’re not supposed to wear jewelry to perform, but I convinced Adelaida to make an exception.”
“Well, I’m flattered.”
“You should be,” I say. “She never lets me wear the jewelry the prince of Cordova gave me.”
His eyebrows lift.
“I’m joking,” I say.
“Thank goodness. I would so hate to fight the prince of Cordova. I’m told he’s a biter.”
A surprised laugh comes out of me. He’s joking too, I know—but does it mean something that he would joke about fighting for me? “Are you enjoying your party?”
He gives one of his single-breath laughs. “It’s hardly mine.”
He’s a good dancer, sure-footed and rhythmic. His grip on my hand is barely too tight.
“But you’re the king,” I say. “Everything is yours.”
I’m pleased to see the way he smiles. I feel as though I’ve begun to unlock a secret.
“Your performance,” he says, “was astonishing.”
“Astonishing enough that you might put the flyers on the royal fleet?” I say.
As soon as I say it, I know I’ve made a mistake. His eyes narrow. His shoulders stiffen. I let the heady feeling of a successful performance intoxicate me. I was too bold. A curtain drops between us.
“You’ve heard, then?” he says.
I’m grateful he doesn’t try to reassure me with a lie.
“I’ve heard,” I say.
“And now you’re here,” he says, nodding at our joined hands as we twirl across the floor, “because you’re trying to get on the royal fleet a different way. You play Gospodin’s game well.”
“Gospodin’s game?” I say.
“It was his idea,” Nikolai says. “That I marry a Kostrovian girl.”
“Whatever game Gospodi
n plays,” I say, “you’re the most powerful man in Kostrov. That’s why I’m not dancing with Gospodin. I’m dancing with you.”
Nikolai’s smile is a serpentine thing, sly and curling. The lift of his lip reveals teeth as white as young pearls. “You pander to my ego.”
“And you to mine. I imagine I’m the envy of every girl here, being your first dance.”
“You’re the prettiest,” he says, almost off-handedly, and I can’t tell whether it’s meant to be a compliment or whether he really believes it. “And none of the merchants’ daughters can fly.” That’s also not precisely true—half the girls in Kostrov have taken a flying lesson at one point—but I’m smart enough not to speak my mind this time.
Instead, I say, “Did Gospodin ever ask you whom you wanted to marry?”
Nikolai frowns. “No.”
I tilt my head nearer to Nikolai’s, the better to keep my dangerous words private. “Has anyone ever asked you?”
“No,” he says.
“Well, maybe they should.” I know I’m walking on a knife’s edge. Nikolai trusts his councilors. Gospodin more than any of them. But I can also hear the tinge of bitterness in his voice when he says Gospodin’s name. “Like I said. You’re the most powerful man in Kostrov. I don’t see why you shouldn’t get to choose for yourself.”
We step one-two-three-four beats to the music. He lets go of one of my hands, so I spin away from him, then he pulls me back. “You’re bold.”
“Too bold?”
The music ends, and he raises my hand to his lips. “Just bold enough.” He presses a kiss to my knuckles. Softly, he adds, “Natasha.”
This is the first moment I believe I could truly be queen.
The song has scarcely faded from the air when a man I recognize vaguely, his cheeks alcohol-flushed, arrives with a young woman on his arm.
“Your Royal Highness,” he says, dropping low. “My daughter, Sylvia.”
Sylvia and her father both ignore me as I’m exchanged out. A new song begins. I catch Nikolai’s gaze one last time over Sylvia’s shoulder. Then the crowd pushes me, and he’s gone.
Before I can pick my way to where the flyers are clustered, Gospodin appears in front of me in a white suit. He holds a flute of fizzing wine by the stem and greets me with a smile.
“Mariner Gospodin,” I say.
“Miss Koskinen. A lovely performance.”
“I’ve been meaning to talk to you since the festival. I was horrified. About the mud.”
“Why?” he says.
I wasn’t expecting that. “Because—because those people disrespected the crown and the Sacred Breath.”
“And that horrified you? Those people were expressing frustration because they fear they won’t be allowed on the royal fleet. You have no empathy for them?”
“I . . . Of course I have empathy for them. We all want a spot on the fleet.”
He looks at me, head tilted slightly. Calculating. “You overheard Adelaida and me talking that day in the Stone Garden, didn’t you? I should’ve known as much.”
I stand up a little straighter. “With all due respect, Mariner Gospodin, I think you’re making a mistake. The Royal Flyers are an important part of Kostrovian history. I don’t think any fleet would be complete without—”
He holds up a hand. “Every Kostrovian life is an important part of Kostrovian history.”
I shut my mouth.
“You’re a determined girl, Miss Koskinen, I’ll give you that. I can tell from the way you perform. You don’t accept anything less than the best. We have that in common. I will do whatever it takes to save as many lives as I can save. I will do whatever it takes to bring Kostrov and the Sacred Breath into the New World. So if you think I’ve miscalculated, you should consider the possibility that I’m simply operating with more information than you have access to.”
I see the flyers on the other side of the room. I want to get to them. I want to get out of this conversation, where I feel myself losing ground with every word. “Um,” I say. I start to inch away.
“I love history,” Gospodin says, “so if you’ll indulge me, I’d like to share a story. I remember the first royal festivities I attended. When I was no older than you and just a good friend of Nikolai’s father. You know, I remember meeting your mother at some of those parties.”
“Oh?” I can hardly get the sound to leave my lips.
“Oh, yes. She was a beauty, to be sure, and she knew it, sauntering around the room in her costume. I thought she’d try to steal the king out from under the queen, truth be told, until I saw her kiss that guard father of yours right on the mouth, in front of everyone.”
My heart pounds.
“You know,” he says, “I find that Captain’s Log has some excellent wisdom about productive unions.”
Productive unions. It takes me a moment to understand what he means, and even then, I’m not sure I’ve gotten it right. Happy marriages? Sacred Breath–approved sexual encounters?
“I do hope you’ll share,” I say.
He accepts my sarcasm generously. “Every Flood thrusts the world closer to a destined, golden era. Each one of us, in turn, can see ourselves as steps on this long staircase. Our children must be better than us; their children, better than them. A woman must be well in her place at a loving man’s side if she hopes to rear children better than herself.”
“Is that so?” I say. I hear the tightness in my own voice.
“Your mother didn’t heed that wisdom,” he says. “And look at you. You’re her twin.”
I fight to steady my breathing. “Mariner Gospodin,” I say, “should I assume your advice is a way of telling me you don’t want me to dance with Nikolai again?”
“Perhaps you’re smarter than your mother after all.” His eyes sweep to Nikolai and Sylvia, dancing still though two songs have passed. “Sylvia Kanerva would make an elegant queen, don’t you think?”
“She’s lovely,” I say. “But like you said, I’m determined. You need a determined queen in the New World, don’t you? Someone who would do anything for Kostrov?”
“Are you suggesting we could be allies?”
I search his expression for approval and find none. “You don’t trust me,” I say.
“No, Miss Koskinen. I do not.”
“Well, then,” I say. “I’ll have to prove you wrong.”
His eyes run the ridges of my face, counting up the pieces as he might sum numbers in a math problem. “I look forward to it.”
30
ELLA
I can’t tear my eyes from Natasha. She meets Nikolai in the middle of the ballroom. She smiles. Flirts. He smiles back, and for a minute, something in that smile—the round curve of his lips or the gleam of teeth beneath them—reminds me of Cassia.
The room spins.
Katla, Sofie, Ness, Gretta, and I stand by our forgotten silks as we watch Natasha dance. With Nikolai. Midway through the song, Ness’s friend Sylvia swishes past us in her glamorous gown.
“Have you seen my father?” she asks Ness. She doesn’t look at us. Her eyes are glued to Natasha and Nikolai too. Without waiting for an answer, Sylvia says, “Handsome pair they make? Very . . .” Her lips tug as she searches for something suitably complimentary. “Tall.”
“Wow,” Gretta says, grinning at the crowd. “I’ve never seen so many people looking furious at the same time.”
It’s true. The crowd, as a whole, doesn’t look thrilled to see Nikolai and Natasha dancing. I suppose everyone wants to dance with Nikolai tonight. I hope they all treat themselves to a nice, long shower to scrub away the smell of him. I don’t understand how Natasha can’t feel it. How cold he must be. How calculating.
“Well,” Sylvia says, voice straining, “perhaps Natasha will be kind enough to give the rest of us a turn at some point.”
Ness turn
s to Sylvia. Frowns. “Are you angling for queen? What about Johan?”
“A few of my father’s friends from the Sacred Breath thought I should consider the possibility. It’s over with Johan,” Sylvia says.
Ness’s eyes are wide. “Oh, but I so hoped Natasha and Nikolai would be together. But I—I can support both of you, of course. I mean . . .” She glances at the rest of us. Poor Ness. She really is too kind for her own good.
“Wait,” Katla says, turning on Sylvia. “Your father is a high government official. Surely you’re on the royal fleet whether or not Nikolai knows your name.”
Sylvia’s smile grows stonier. “I’m not sure I see your point.”
“Are you sure?” I say. “Because you kind of look like you do.”
“I’m sorry,” Ness says, taking Sylvia’s hand. “We don’t mean to be rude. We’re just—don’t tell anyone, but there’s news that the flyers won’t all be on the fleet, and we’ve been hoping that if Natasha is queen, she could get us all on board.”
“Don’t be silly, Ness,” Sylvia says. “Surely your family has a spot confirmed.”
Just how rich is Ness?
“That’s not really the point,” Ness says.
Sylvia glances at the rest of us. “And as for rest of you, you may as well go dance with Nikolai yourself tonight. The roster is finished. My father showed it to me. They can’t just add half a dozen people wherever they feel like it. Don’t let Natasha fool you into thinking she’ll whisk you along into the New World. She’d know as much. Oh—there’s my father. Lovely talking.”
And then she’s gone.
“Well,” Katla says. “Shit.”
We’re all quiet as we watch Natasha break away from Nikolai, her dance ending. She stops to talk to Gospodin. He lays a fatherly hand on her shoulder. They smile.
She’d know as much.
It’s not that I feel like I, personally, have lost a place on the fleet. But I can’t help but feel a little betrayed anyway. I misread Natasha. She’s not out there fighting for the flyers; she’s fighting for herself.
Girls at the Edge of the World Page 15
